


Endor

by treetracer



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-01
Updated: 2020-02-01
Packaged: 2021-02-25 17:35:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22499893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/treetracer/pseuds/treetracer
Summary: "The chemlight illuminated her features, cast them in warm hues, and the fireflies retreated, intimidated by the alien light. Cara looked at him, tried to see past his visor, to see his eyes and, though Din knew she could not, her stare made him wonder."
Relationships: Cara Dune & The Mandalorian (The Mandalorian TV), Cara Dune/The Mandalorian (The Mandalorian TV)
Comments: 23
Kudos: 124





	Endor

He could not sleep. His mind a whirlwind of wandering thoughts as vast and unorganized as the moonless sky he gazed up at. His body ached for him to rest, to slip into dreamless slumber, and allow him to recoup the energy he’d spent over the last few days. It was funny, he mused, how tiredness often worked – so exhausted that he could not find sleep. 

The Mandalorian exhaled, rolled to his side, and looked to the cool firepit before him. He and Cara had opted to sleep outside – the thought of another night cooped up the Crest seemed like a death wish. One could only do so many days in tight quarters before it began to feel like a prison and not a star cruiser. The last day on their trip to Endor had resulted in snapped remarks and a small scuffle – that had ended in a draw when they’d realized that the Child had been watching them. When they’d landed on Endor they had parted ways. The only words they had exchanged were those of location and time of return. He’d busied himself the rest of the day with mindless, domestic, tasks. 

Cara returned when she’d said that she would and not a minute sooner. She’d tossed him the money that she’d acquired and placed the new supply of food rations in the Crest. He didn’t ask questions; he didn’t have to. She’d come back safe and that’s all he cared about – what she did in her spare time was her business, not his. The new bruise under her eye and the slight limp to her gait, however, told him all he needed to know. 

Time apart after days of being on top of one another had been time well spent. Both he and Cara had fallen back into a comfortable routine again. He’d set up camp, she’d occupied the Youngling, a meal was prepped and, to his amusement, it was Cara that the child had picked to be fed by. Soft laughter and idle chattered had filled the space of dinner. Cara boasted about her win in a small brawling ring in the village just down in the valley. She’d offered to demonstrate but he’d politely declined, he was still nursing tender ribs from their last adventure. He’d given her the respect she was due, a good natured and genuine complement too, because it was well deserved. She was an extraordinary fighter and person, and he was glad to have her around. 

When dinner had concluded they’d settled in by the fire and exchanged softly spoken words over embers, tired thoughts whispered through the deep darkness of a moonless night. Until Cara’s words drifted into nonsense and then she spoke no more. Times such as these, Din knew, were likely to be few and far between and the tenderness of it all, the simple honesty of it, tore a hole in his chest that he feared would never close. 

He looked over to Cara, the thermal imaging of his visor turned off, and saw only a hint of a shadow in the inky depths of the night. The light of the stars shone too weakly to illuminate anything beyond the towering treetops. 

“You awake?” her voice was quiet, not rough like she’d been sleeping. 

“No,” he replied dryly and it earned him a chuckle. He smiled despite himself. Heavy silence fell between them before he stood, turned on his visor so that he could see better, and stepped away from his bedroll. “I’m going to check the perimeter,” he said. 

“I’m coming with,” she said and stood. He didn’t protest and waited while she grabbed a chemlight from her bag, turned it on its lowest setting, and joined him. 

There had been nothing of note around the perimeter that they had established and both Shock Trooper and Mandalorian were thankful. A few small tracks from herbivorous wildlife, the ever-present melodic hum of nameless insects, and the soft call of a distant night bird was all they’d encountered on their patrol. Cara had been quiet throughout the walk but Din had felt the tension of a question on the air while they’d meandered along their route. 

“What’s your question?” Din asked Cara as he drew to a stop amid a waltzing constellation of fireflies. She stopped and he turned to look at her. The chemlight illuminated her features, cast them in warm hues, and the fireflies retreated, intimidated by the alien light. Cara looked at him, tried to see past his visor, to see his eyes and, though Din knew she could not, her stare made him wonder. 

“That day, back on Navarro, when...” her mouth formed a tight line and she paused a moment, “when you were... dying,” the word came out partly strangled and she shook her head with a cynical smile. She seemed frustrated by the betrayal of her voice to emotion. Saying it, however, made it much more real and it felt different to have heard it on the air than to have thought in his head. 

“Yes?” he urged. 

“The IG unit removed your helmet, didn’t it?” she asked and he nodded. 

“It did,” the Mandalorian affirmed and he could see the next, logical question form on her full lips. He let her voice it. 

“I thought your creed forbid all living things from seeing you without your helmet?” she asked and the Mandalorian nodded. 

“Yes, but the droid pointed out that he was not a living thing. So... I let him remove it,” he admitted and felt his chest tighten in response to an emotion and desire he wasn’t sure how to place. Since the events on Navarro he’d wondered how he was going to proceed with the ways of his new Clan, the one his signet had given life to. Would he continue with the ways of the old Clan or would he do something new? Would he be willing to take off his helmet before others? Those of the Wren Clan often did, but could he? 

He shoved the thoughts from his mind but the weight of them only seemed to grow when he looked to Cara. She was much closer now, curiosity in her keen gaze, and he felt the tempo of his heart rise but he revealed nothing, didn’t shy away, and stood his ground. 

“Not often a droid finds a loop hole that big,” she said, the corner of her lip turned upward in a smirk before it fell, just as quickly, to a somber expression. “I’m glad he found it,” she said, lower, barely heard above the hush of wind through the trees. It pulled at her hair, obscured her eyes, as she looked up to him and Din knew, if there was ever a person that had ever existed that he wanted to show his face to, it was her. The knowledge strangled him and he beat down the sudden swell of emotions with god-like ferocity. He inhaled – then exhaled. 

“Can I trust you?” Din asked her and she knitted her brow in visible confusion. “I need you to answer. Can I trust you?” he asked again and she nodded, still uncertain of his intention. 

“Yes,” she answered, slowly, as she considered him and allowed silence to fill the dimly lit wood. Cara took a half step back from him though her eyes never left his Besker-clad face. Din let his own question sink in – did he trust her? He reached for her chemlight and she relinquished it. 

He clicked the lamp off and plunged them into darkness. 

Din sat the light down and kicked it into the woods. The only illumination came from the constellations above and the twinkling lights of the fireflies around them. Din stepped closer to her; through the visor of his helm he could see her eyes blindly search the night. He felt his heart leap to his throat, his face flushed, and he wondered if this was the right choice. 

_I trust her,_ he thought to himself as he remembered how she’d tried to comfort him in the face of his mortality. How she had pleaded with him to come with them, even as he reminded her that he was beyond salvation, and that the remainder of his life would be best spent saving them. She’d held his hand then, in his dying moments, protected him even though it was a vain effort. He’d heard her command the IG unit to bring him back – to save him. 

His chest constricted again and he pulled his hands free of his gloves and shoved them into his pocket. Din reached for her hands, she inhaled sharply at the contact, and the sensation of her bare hands in his sent electricity up his spine. 

“Din...” she exhaled and the sound was so painfully intimate that it made his chest ache. Cara never called him by his given name and now that he had heard it on her lips, he wished it would stay there. Din drew her hands upward, to the lip of his helmet, and left them there. “What about your Creed?” she whispered, concerned. 

“Can you see me?” he asked quietly, afraid that he might break his resolve if he spoke any louder. 

“No,” she said and understood why he’d done what he had. She lifted the helmet from his head, reverently lowered it to the ground, then placed her hands on his face. 

Din inhaled the sweet air of the Endor forest, unobstructed by the helm, and tried to steel himself, uncertain of how she’d proceed or how she’d react. Already he missed the assisted vision that his helmet gave him and the sense of security that came with it. 

Cara cupped his face in her hands, the action careful, delicate, and warm. Her kind touch was a welcomed contrast to her usual mannerisms. He’d seen her hands do terrible things. He’d seen her beat creatures twice her size into submission, had personally felt the powerful force of her blows, and witnessed the speed at which she fired a blaster. Yet, despite this, she sketched his face with feather-light touches, soft caresses, and a manner of reverence he hadn’t been prepared for. 

Her fingers lingered over the fullness of his lips and traced them several times over with the pad of her thumb. Din drew his hand up to hers and pressed a kiss to her palm. She stepped closer, slowly closed the cool gap between them, and he slipped one hand around to the small of her back. Cara was softer than he remembered her being. He’d felt the bulk of her body protect him, muscles tense, body ridged with adrenaline and desperation as she shielded him from the chaos of combat. It was different now; in this moment there was no gunfire, no endless inferno, no death. It was only the endless starry sky above them, the flickering constellation of fireflies, and the cool veil of night that bore witness to them. 

Cara traced her fingertips over the stubble on his cheek, drew him closer to her, and he leaned down without question. A cacophony of a thousand fears and doubts rang in his ear then and reminded him of what this closeness could mean, what it could do to them. 

The brush of her lips against his, featherlight and warm, drew him up out of the mire of his mind and back to the present. He wanted this. 

“Cara,” he prayed against her mouth and she closed the distance between them. He slipped a hand along her jaw and into her hair, held her against him as he savored all that she was and all that she was willing to give. The fullness of her body against him was a soft, welcomed, weight that warmed him in ways he hadn’t words to describe. 

She kissed him deeper and he relinquished himself to the simplicity of the moment, the sensation of their bodies pressed together, the intoxicating taste of her affections, and the quiet sounds of the forest around them. He wouldn’t worry about tomorrow or what the next day would bring, how he’d continue his objective, or even how he’d deal with the aftermath of this decision. For the moment it was her, and only her. 

He licked his lips when they parted and lingered in the warmth of her breath before he reluctantly pulled away from her. Her chest heaved against his, breathless, just as he was. He didn’t want to leave, not yet, but he knew they had been away for a while and his concern for the child urged him to move. 

“We should get back to the ship,” he said as he reached up and brushed a thumb over her cheek before he placed a lingering kiss against her forehead. 

“Yes,” she breathed out into the coolness of the night. Din leaned down, plucked his helmet off the ground, and placed it, slowly, back onto his head. The visor lit up, giving him a fraction of an advantage in the dark, and with that he walked over to the discarded chemlight and picked it up. The ancient light flickered to life and illuminated the immediate area. He handed it to Dune and she took it. 

They walked in silence back to the Razor Crest and Din was glad for the quiet because he wasn’t sure he had his tongue enough to speak. 

When they arrived back at the Crest, Din checked in on the little one, he was still sleeping soundly in his pram and Din counted his blessings. He and Cara had been gone longer than he’d intended and the child was prone to wandering when unattended. Carefully he adjusted the blankets around the Youngling before he returned to his bedroll, laid down, and looked back up to the stars. 

He could sleep now. His body relaxed into the thin pad below him and he felt the first strong pulls of slumber when her voice pulled him back to wakefulness. 

“Din...” she whispered and he rolled his head to look her way, past the cool firepit. The sound of his given name on her voice made his chest tighten. 

“Yes?” he replied, quietly. There was a lengthy pause and he found himself struggling to stay awake for its duration. 

“I’m glad that... you trust me,” she said and Din held his breath for a beat, surprised by her honestly, and also relieved by it. 

“... and I’m glad that you trust me too,” he said, then turned his gaze heavenward again and let sleep pull him under, into a blissful and restful, respite.

**Author's Note:**

> It occurs to me that this kiss may have been Mando's first one which I wish I had nodded at in the story but, when I went back to add it in, it didn't seem to fit in anywhere. That being said, I may make this and my story Vandor part of a series and nod at his first kiss with Cara in a later fic. Any ideas for more fics is always welcome! As always my loves, please leave some constructive comments below or just a simple hello <3 Stay sharp my friends.


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